RS

MEMBER DIARY

Integrity and Choice: Commentary on the Charlie Crist Campaign

Charlie Crist has, apparently, has begun to backtrack on his pledge not to run as an independent, a pledge he made in no uncertain terms when he and Marco Rubio debated a couple weeks ago on “Fox News Sunday”. If memory serves me correctly, if he does plan to go independent, he will have to make the move this month (30 April) or else he will not be eligible to be on the ballot as an independent. (Actually, I’m sure of it).

I was in the Navy. There was one thing that you could not compromise on was your word. If it became apparent that your word was not to be trusted, your career would probably not prosper. I am also a father of a 14 year old son. Like all boys, he has made mistakes, thought he pull a fast one on the old man (just like I thought I could when I was his age), etc. Those times I have caught him, the lesson I drive home is that “giving your word and keeping to that promise” is the one of the most important traits you must have if you are to be considered a serious and trustworthy man. A man who breaks his word is a man not to be trusted. Almost always, such a man always seeks the easy way out and will always put his self-interest above all others, even above the best interests of his own family. John Edwards and Tiger Woods come to mind.

Charlie Crist, well over a year ago, thought he saw an easy path to becoming a U.S. Senator. When Mel Martinez decided to quit and run away from a job he sought only a few years before, Charlie Crist immediately began to make plans to take his place in the election of 2010. Knowing that it would be political suicide to appoint himself and then try to run for a full term in 2010, he put a faithful lackey in the job as a place warmer and started to prepare, for what he thought, would be his coronation as Senator in 2010.

Unfortunately for him, he made the monumental political miscalculation of embracing Obama’s ill advised Stimulus Plan (aka “Porkulus”). Obama had carried Florida and Crist, abandoning what little “Republican Core Principles” he had, eagerly rushed forth to greet the conquering hero and endorse, what he perceived, was the new political reality. Never mind that sober-minded Republicans were saying that both TARP and “Porkulus” were economic suicide, Charlie went ahead and made his Faustian bargain with Obama. It was the easy thing to do, you see. Charlie has always been a political animal, always on the prowl for the quick, easy way to the top.

What he didn’t count on was Marco Rubio (who has run, so far, the Perfect Insurgent Campaign) and the cold hard economic reality that Obamanomics WILL NEVER, EVER WORK! They haven’t worked in Europe, they haven’t worked in South America, they haven’t worked in Japan or Asia, they haven’t worked ANYWHERE ON PLANET EARTH….It is that simple. Just today, the Obama administration (who are well aware that we can’t afford all this) is raising the specter of the Value Added Tax, the “economic heroin” of the modern welfare state. They have it in Europe and guess what, IT IS STILL NOT ENOUGH. The bill is coming due there just like here. A government that replaces the private sector as the main source of the people’s livelihood, will ALWAYS fail. That’s what caused the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Apparently BOTH Obama and Charlie Crist don’t understand this one, simple economic truth.

Well, the easy path to Senator is gone. Either he wins the Senate Seat this year, or he never will. He knows that. Charlie Crist measures his own self-worth by winning election to the next highest office, not by acting in the best interests of the citizens he purportedly represents. He KNOWS he will lose the Republican Primary to Rubio. That fact was driven home by his joint appearance with Rubio on Fox. It was an unmitigated disaster for Crist. He went straight to gutter politics right from the get go, and eventually wound up in the foul depths of the political sewer by the end of the debate. He had hoped for a political miracle to save his campaign, instead he got his head handed to him on a silver platter. The irony is it was more or less an act of self-decapitation by Charlie himself.

Charlie Crist is facing being a lame-duck governor as of August 24, 2010. He is in this pickle because he made what looked like the easy choices to get the seat. And like I tell my son, choosing the easy way usually winds up in disaster.

If Charlie Crist decides to go independent, the first question the press and the people of Florida should ask him: Why did you break your word? My young son already knows that is wrong for a man to do. So should Charlie Crist.